Sony HDR-CX550VE

Still Features (10.38)

The HDR-CX550V has all the still features you expect to see from a flagship camcorder. Unfortunately, the photos produced by the camcorder aren't nearly as good as what you could get from a dedicated still camera—but that's the case with nearly every camcorder we've tested. The CX550V has a built-in flash above its large lens, and the flash offers three intensity settings (high, normal, or low) as well as a red-eye reduction option.

The camcorder has a lot of still image size options, but the highest native resolution available is a 2880 x 2160 setting (around 6.2 megapixels). The two larger photo options (4000 x 3000 and 4000 x 2250) are interpolated, which means the photos produced are essentially "blown-up" versions of a 6.2-megapixel still image. There are also some smaller photo size options, including a 640 x 480 VGA option.

Built-in flash		The mode button switches between photo and video modes.

One of the most talked about still features on the HDR-CX550V is its smile shutter setting. This feature enables the camcorder to automatically capture a still image whenever a subject in the frame smiles. The feature sounds like it wouldn't be that precise, but it actually works quite well—and you can set the smile detection sensitivity to low, medium, or high. On the high setting, the camcorder interprets most smirks or lip curls as smiles, while the low setting requires a rather exaggerated grin to initiate an automatic response from the camcorder's shutter. Smile shutter can be set so that it is always on, or it can be set to work during video recording only (it can also be turned off completely).

Still Colour (11.18)

The HDR-CX550V rendered still images with excellent colour accuracy, but all the other camcorders in this testing set also did very well on this test. The CX550V measured a colour error of 3.13 and an ideal saturation level of 100.6%. These are significantly better numbers than what we saw with in our bight light video test. (More on how we test still colour.)

The still photography colour error map: the length and direction of each line indicates how the camcorder processed each particular colour.

The CX550V appeared to capture photos with a warmer, redder tone than the competition (although the Canon HF S21 also had a bit of a warm tone on its still images). You can see what we're talking about in the colour comparison images below. All of these camcorders managed to capture bright, colourful images in our still photo testing.

Sony HDR-CX550V Still Colour Comparisons
Sony HDR-CX550V	Panasonic HDC-TM700
Canon HF S21	JVC GZ-HM1

Still Colour Score Comparison		Compare the Sony HDR-CX550V to the Panasonic HDC-TM700
		Compare the Sony HDR-CX550V to the Canon HF S21
		Compare the Sony HDR-CX550V to the JVC GZ-HM1

Still Noise (1.35)

The Sony HDR-CX550V averaged 1.2% noise in its still photos, which is too high. We'd like to see this number at least below 1%, and we're surprised that the CX550V had more than double the amount of noise in its still photos as it did in our bright light video testing (0.4475% noise). Still, 1.2% noise isn't terrible, and you probably won't run into any major noise problems unless you're taking photos in low light situations. (More on how we test still noise.)

Still Noise Score Comparison		Compare the Sony HDR-CX550V to the Panasonic HDC-TM700
		Compare the Sony HDR-CX550V to the Canon HF S21
		Compare the Sony HDR-CX550V to the JVC GZ-HM1

Still Sharpness (6.13)

With a 6-megapixel effective pixel count for still photos, the Sony HDR-CX550V was able to capture decently-sharp still images in our testing. The camcorder managed a horizontal sharpness of 1669 lw/ph with 4.5% undersharpening, and a 1780 lw/ph vertical sharpness with 15.2% undersharpening. Like we said before, these are good numbers for a camcorder with a  6-megapixel native resolution on its still photos. The Canon HF S21 and JVC GZ-HM1—both of which have higher native pixel counts than the CX550V—were able to do quite a bit better on this test. (More on how we test still sharpness.)

Still Sharpness Score Comparison		Compare the Sony HDR-CX550V to the Panasonic HDC-TM700
		Compare the Sony HDR-CX550V to the Canon HF S21
		Compare the Sony HDR-CX550V to the JVC GZ-HM1